


Lightning and Clockwork

by Jougetsu



Series: Lightning and Clockwork [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-06
Updated: 2018-08-06
Packaged: 2019-06-17 19:20:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15468267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jougetsu/pseuds/Jougetsu
Summary: Anthony Spencer had given up on romance until fate throws a mysterious stranger his way.





	Lightning and Clockwork

**Author's Note:**

  * For [exchequered (kesterstjohn)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kesterstjohn/gifts).



ANTHONY Spencer was never going to find love. Of that he was now certain. He told his brother and sister-in-law so one rainy late September morn. 

“I shall never find love. Of that I am certain!” he flopped dramatically into the parlor chair. 

“Do mind the upholstery, Duckling,” William peered over his newspaper. “It can only survive so many swoons.” 

“Are you that unfeeling, Biffles?” Anthony narrowed his eyes, grey as storm clouds or at least that was what a former lover had told him. “I am in great despair and you fret about the furnishings!”

“Your brother is merely teasing you, dearest,” said Sarah. “Come to the table and have some more breakfast. Hunger only adds to despair.” 

“It is all very well for Biffles.” Anthony was indeed tempted by the breakfast spread and his metaphorical feathers were slightly soothed by Sarah’s overtures. “He got to marry you, Sarah, which was much more than he ever deserved. Biffles, you stole all the luck in the family for this generation! Nathan and I cannot possibly hope to find true love when you’ve hogged the darling of Aphrodite.” 

Sarah and William laughed, not unkindly. 

“When I die in a mysterious accident I give you leave to marry Sarah,” William put on an air of false magnanimity. 

If Anthony was eight instead of eight-and-twenty he would have stuck his tongue out at William. As it was it was a near miss. “You know I cannot love Sarah the way she deserves. Better for her to be a merry widow and lavishly spend your inheritance whilst I waste away writing poetry on the moors or something.”

Sarah laughed harder, a jolly laugh that wasn’t tinkling bells or any nonsense. “If you plan out my widowhood without consulting me then I daresay there may be several mysterious accidents, you awful boys.” 

William put his paper aside to kiss his wife’s hand and give her a besotted gaze that made Anthony despair all over again. No one, not even his first lover had ever looked upon him so tenderly! 

“Duckling, I know it is a great deal more difficult for you to find romance,” William said softly. “But you are not friendless or without family. There will always be love in your life even if is not romantic.” 

Anthony did not think himself ungrateful for those blessings. It seemed unfair that he should content himself to be without any romance all because he had no interest in the fairer sex. 

“Everyone deserves a nice romance,” Sarah chided her husband. “Anthony is allowed to be discontent with the injustice of it all.”

“Has there not been anyone of interest at your club?” William knew about the Club and Anthony’s proclivities. 

“We’re not encouraged to seek each other outside the club,” said Anthony. “And even if I was inclined to break the rules there has been no one of note. They’re all very amiable…” 

But any of the ones he had wanted to dally with he had already done so ages ago or were uninterested in him. Despite society tittering that such places were hardly better than brothels there was really more camaraderie than anything salacious. No one worked there like at a brothel, couples merely paid for rooms upstairs when they wanted to be intimate. Anthony had spent more time dancing, piano playing, and losing at card games than he had ever in the upper chambers.

“Perhaps you need a holiday on the continent,” suggested William. “There are a great many gentlemen of similar interests and much less of the fishbowl existence one finds here in the town.” 

The idea had merit, but Anthony could hardly find the energy to be enthused about the prospect. “Perhaps in the summer. The season is starting and you know how cantankerous I become when I do not get my fill of dancing.”

That might have been the end of it until the spring if Anthony had not been late going to the tailor two days later. In a fit of pique he decided he simply must have a new waistcoat or three and a new coat and perhaps cravats to bring out his eyes. As Anthony was late to the tailor he was late to dine and because he was late to dine he was late at the club. As a general rule Anthony did not stay much past midnight there. By then most of those who wished to couple had paired off and gone upstairs leaving few in the parlors. 

However that evening Anthony was loathe to return to his townhouse. How empty and bleak it loomed in his mind. Even the thought of his favorite books at his bedside did not give him comfort. Thus he stayed and listened to the stories of some of the older men who were more given to chatting than tumbling. They encouraged Anthony to go to the continent when he offhandedly mentioned William’s suggestion. Indeed Anthony heard more than a few colorful anecdotes about the passionate French, the devoted Swiss, and enigmatic Italians. Some more colorful than others and had Anthony squirming in his chair much to his dismay. 

But tailors and talking paled to what happened when Anthony left the club. With the pouring rain he could not walk home and so he was in the hired cab when the thunderstorm unfurled itself over the city. A few blocks away from his home there came a lightning strike powerful enough to shake the carriage. 

And unless Anthony was very much mistaken it had struck a man dead in the street. 

“I say, stop! Stop, my good man!” he pounded the roof of the cab.

Without a second though he alighted from the carriage and ran over to the prone figure. Wisps of smoke rose from the man’s clothes and briefcase, but the stranger was breathing faintly from what Anthony could tell in the rain. 

With the cab driver’s assistance Anthony took the stranger home. The driver received a generous amount to go to the home of Doctor Bryant and relay him to Anthony’s doorstep.

“Terribly sorry, Randall,” Anthony apologized sheepishly to his valet. “We’ve an unexpected guest. This gentleman may well have been struck by lightning.” 

“I see, sir,” Randall, bless him, was unruffled even in his dressing gown and woken up suddenly at two in the morning. 

“The cab driver’s gone to fetch the doctor, but I think the best course is to make him comfortable in the guest room while we wait for Bryant,” Anthony hung his coat and put the briefcase aside. “I’ll help you of course, my good deed shouldn’t put you out.” 

Not to mention it was nearly impossible to convey an unconscious grown man up two flights of stairs by oneself. Randall was well-built and strong, but he was not that strong.

By three o’clock, beastly, awful, dreary three o’clock when things are their darkest, Bryant was finally done with examining the mystery patient. The man had stirred a few times and Bryant had been able to briefly waken him. 

“His breathing is good, but the heart is a bit weaker than ideal,” Bryant sipped the nightcap of brandy Randall brought them in the parlor before he retired to bed. “He could well have been struck by lightning. It was good you brought him home. The Good Lord only knows what may have become of him had he been left on the street all night.” 

Anthony shuddered, “To be touched by Jupiter and tell the tale! I hope he’ll be well in the end. Whoever he is.” 

“Keep his room warm and feed him a light broth or porridge when he wakes. Let him drink whatever he can keep down,” said Bryant. “If he does not wake in twelve hours send for me.” 

Another cab was fetched and the doctor left. Anthony went up to the guest room with a glass of water. 

The stranger was a handsome man, made even more alluring by the firelight. He had a regal face with classical features, a complexion that many would term ‘olive,’ and thick ebony hair with a hint of wave to it. Anthony would have believed him a Roman statue brought to life if not for the sweet imperfections - a trio of little moles under his right ear, the thin line of scar tissue extending from his left ring finger, where a strangely engraved bronze ring kept residence, down the back of his hand, and his ears that were a little too big to be fashionable. 

Anthony set down the water at the bedside table and dragged the fireside chair a little closer to the bed, making himself comfortable. “I do not mean anything untoward,” he told the sleeping man. “But it is worrisome that Bryant said your heart sounded weak. So I shall keep watch over you for a bit if you do not mind.” 

All the fatigue had scurried from Anthony’s mind and now he was wide awake and full of curiosity. Who could this man be? The briefcase hinted at a scholar or bureaucrat, but his visage and clothing spoke of gentility even nobility. Nathaniel with his sharp wit and cynicism would probably say that it was a confidence artist who was simply waiting for Anthony to fall asleep to rob the townhouse. Not that Anthony could blame him, after all Nathaniel was a naval captain. To be jaded was as much a requirement as a commission. 

No Florence Nightingale was he, but Anthony could hardly help stroking the man’s hair when he made trouble noises in his sleep. He soaked a handkerchief in the wash basin and even wiped the sweat from his guest’s brow. Once or twice the man’s eyelids fluttered open and Anthony glimpsed the honey colored eyes hidden beneath them. 

Heaven help him, the man was breathtaking. It would serve Anthony right if he turned out to be a horrible prat when he regained consciousness. But for just that moment he was Anthony’s prince sent by the gods of love and beauty. 

Sleep hedged back into Anthony’s brain. But before he let the tide take him he kissed his sleeping prince’s forehead. It was a liberty, an incalculable one, but he would berate himself for it later. 

Fragments of dreams skittered here and there, nothing complete or comprehensive. Anthony’s prince may have been there as well. But when he woke to sunlight streaming in his face the stranger was gone. 

In his place on the bed was a note. 

‘My generous host,

Words cannot express the whole of my gratitude towards you and your exquisite hospitality. It is certain I would have perished had it not been for your most timely intervention. It is with deepest regret that I must leave on urgent business before better making your dear acquaintance. 

When my business is concluded surely we shall meet again if nothing so that I may reciprocate the tenderness shown to me. 

In time, 

E-’ 

“All the doors and windows are still locked, sir,” Randall reported to him short while later in the parlor. “Nothing of value seems to have been taken.” 

“I am glad he was not a thief, whatever else he may have been,” Anthony said with a thick swallow. The was scarcely any weight at all, but Anthony felt it heavy in his pocket all the same.

“Of particular note I must inform you, sir,” said Randall. “I had locked the gentleman’s briefcase in your study for safekeeping.” 

“And when you looked in upon the study the briefcase had vanished and all means of egress were tightly secured?” Anthony hazarded. 

“Indeed, sir.” 

“I suppose we must chalk this up to one of those random happenstances that occur in life,” Anthony said in a tone much lighter than his mood. “But perhaps I will not make it known to Biffy and Sarah, or Nathan. They would become dreadfully anxious.” 

Randall nodded, a nod that meant he did not quite agree with the young master, but would heed the order all the same. That was the chief issue when one’s valet had known one from childhood. The result was rather like employing a mind-reader. 

It was a novel experience for Anthony to simultaneously wish to remember someone and forget them. The sheer thrill of having met an alluring stranger warred with the disappointment that they would likely never again meet. Anthony half-pretended Monsieur E was an insufferable bore and that had he gotten the better end of the bargain for never hearing him speak. He managed to convince Sarah his new habit of sighing and staring into the hearth was simply about missing an auction he’d been too ill to attend. 

Five weeks blurred the memory enough to cease the sighing. Balls and parties were a-plenty and Anthony resolved to go to as many of them as his corporeal form could allow. Dowager Mariette (exquisite taste in art, horrible enthusiasm for small cantankerous dogs) held her soiree earlier than usual in the season before the small exodus of those with ill constitutions fled to warmer climes - making it a boisterous, more crowded occasion than usual. The dance floor swelled with more couples than it could comfortably hold and the tables piled ever higher with delicacies.

Anthony’s stamina held out until one in the morning, when he went upstairs into a little hallway alcove seat to hide from the revelry.

“Are all Englishmen easily fatigued? In my father’s country it is not unusual for a gathering to start from noon and last until dawn of the following day.” The accent was Mediterranean, Spanish or Italian, and the tone somewhere between smoke and honey. Anthony would have certainly gone weak in the knees had he not already been sitting down.

“Perhaps they have stouter hearts and bodies in your father’s country,” Anthony conceded, wiping his brow with his handkerchief. “Or perhaps I am a poor specimen of an Englishman.”

“Damnation!” the stranger in the shadows suddenly cursed. “Of all the-!”

Anthony leapt to his feet, yet in no time at all a thick cloud of smoke filled the hallway obscuring his view. The scent was metallic, sulfuric, and rain-over-rocks, it curdled Anthony’s nose and stung his eyes before clearing. 

“Damnation,” Anthony echoed flatly. For the second time in as many months someone had vanished in his presence. The trend was worrisome to say the least. 

Which is why he promptly went to the club after supper the next evening to lament over his ill fortune. “Two men disappear not ten feet away from me. Am I so abhorrent?” 

“Abhorrent? No, funny dear,” Raph, a regular patron, patted Anthony on the head. “With your grey eyes and perfect Cupid’s bow? You may be old for the tastes of some, but there is nothing off-putting about your person.” 

“Are you sure you have not met a demon?” Bernard said in such earnestness Anthony could not think him in jest. “All that smoke and lightning you described is most suspicious.” 

“If I have it is no doing of mine,” Anthony his glass of wine and contemplated another. “I may have the odd esoteric book or two in my library, but I’ve never attempted magic or summoning.” 

“And you were not insensate from drink or something stronger?” Raph prodded. 

“Both times I was sober as a Monday morning vicar.” 

Bernard began to make the case again for a demon or fallen angel or something supernatural, but Anthony could hardly concentrate. He left the pair to their debate to join the dancers. Not all of the members were proficient on the dance floor, but he would take a badly done waltz to be in a man’s arms at the moment. Three sets later and his dark mood had lifted. Anthony felt he might even be able to joke about it one day soon - Anthony Spencer, the man who makes other men go up in smoke!

“May I have the next dance if you are not otherwise engaged?” A tall man with dark hair inquired when Anthony stopped briefly to get a drink. He had a Continental accent, which was not common but not unheard of in their club. 

“As long as you promise not to step on my toes too often you are more than welcome, sir,” Anthony said glibly. He adjusted his domino mask, a requirement of club membership to deter blackmailers, for it nearly seemed the stranger could see through him. “I allow two toe treads a dance, but only six total for the night.” 

“What is the punishment for a seventh misstep?” the man’s smile twitched with mirth. 

“You have to watch me dance with others and snub you for at least a week,” said Anthony. Not that he had any such worries, his partner already had pulled them into perfect form just as the music began to swell. 

“You are cruel,” the man laughed brightly. 

“Sir, I have not seen you around our club before,” Anthony began. “And yet you are familiar.” 

“I have been to many and more parties this season,” he replied. “Undoubtedly we have brushed paths while unmasked, but at those gatherings would not have been able to dance together.” 

“Were you are Dowager Mariette’s last evening?” While he had not seen the man the voice was too similar to be coincidental. 

“Remind me again what the date was?” the stranger’s forehead wrinkled slightly. 

“November the first, sir.”

“And the year?” Now it was Anthony’s turn to wonder who was insensate from drink or madness. Though the man seemed to be neither.

“The year of our Lord eighteen-hundred and sixty-one.” 

“Ah, yes of course! I was at Dowager Mariette’s briefly. How many dogs does she have, do you know? I lost count after a dozen, but I also could not be sure if I was recounting the same few dogs over and over.” 

“Only the Good Lord knows how many canines reside at that abode,” said Anthony as he leaned in close for his next words. “Fatigued from dancing I went upstairs and a man with a charming accent - identical to yours - teased me about the stamina of Englishmen.” 

The statement had the intended effect, the man’s eyes widened under the mask. “I-” 

“And then he vanished in a great cloud of mysterious smoke though there was no flame,” Anthony continued. “My friend Bernard is convinced the man was a demon. But I do not think that at all. This man seemed to have the harried air of humanity.”

The man’s Adam’s apple bobbed a few times as he swallowed down words that were fighting to get out. He tilted his head to look away a moment and Anthony saw a trio of moles under his right ear. 

“Monsieur E!” Anthony choked out before he could stop himself. 

E turned his head back and stared long and hard at Anthony. “Were you my host that night this September last?” 

“Shh!” Anthony pulled Monsieur E away from the dancing and to an unoccupied corner of the room. “We are not allowed to discuss our lives or identities outside the club. Anyone could be blackmailed from the slightest hint.”

Monsieur E looked crestfallen. So much so that Anthony had to pull out the note he kept with him. “I have not forgotten you,” he whispered. 

“Nor I, you,” E whispered back. “I am Ernesto Eliot, traveler and amateur engineer.” 

Anthony’s heart skipped two beats and then bloomed in happiness. “Anthony Spencer.” His lips touched Ernesto’s ear. 

“I believe I owe you a debt still,” Ernesto grinned, boyish and mischievous, as he leaned in to kiss Anthony. First on the forehead and then more fully on the lips. 

"You are a scoundrel," Anthony pronounced when he got his breath back. "Therefore I am collecting interest on this debt."

Erenesto laughed once more, "That is no hardship!" 

Anthony stopped counting the kisses because they were plentiful enough for once in his life.

Perhaps neither love nor mystery had given up on Anthony Spencer after all.


End file.
